An Outback Marriage

It was a summer’s evening in Sydney, and the northeast wind that comes down from New Guinea and the tropical islands over leagues of warm sea, brought on its wings a heavy depressing moisture. In the streets people walked listlessly, perspired, mopped themselves, and abused their much-vaunted climate. Everyone who could manage it was out of town, either on the heights of Moss Vale or the Blue Mountains, escaping from the Inferno of Sydney.

In the Cassowary Club, weary, pallid waiters brought iced drinks to such of the members as were condemned to spend the summer in town. The gong had sounded, and in ones and twos members shuffled out of the smoking-room, and went in to dinner. At last only three were left talking at the far end of the big, empty smoking-room, like three small stage conspirators at the end of a very large robbers’ cavern.

One was a short, fat, red-faced man, who looked like a combination of sea-captain and merchant, and who was the local representative of a big English steamship company. His connection with the mercantile marine had earned him his nickname of “The Bo’sun.” By his side sat Pinnock, a lean and bilious-looking solicitor; the third man was an English globetrotter, a colourless sort of person, of whom no one took any particular notice until they learnt that he was the eldest son of a big Scotch whisky manufacturer, and had £10, a year of his own. Then they suddenly discovered that he was a much smarter fellow than he looked. The three were evidently waiting for somebody. The “Bo’sun” had a grievance, and was relieving his mind by speech.

As she did so, a youth among the talkers at the other end of the room looked round, and stared for a second. Then he moistened his fingers with his tongue, smoothed the hair on his temples, and with elbows held out from his sides, shoulders hunched up, and under-jaw stuck well out, bore down on Carew and the girl, who were getting under way when he came up. Taking not the slightest notice of Carew, he touched the girl on the shoulder with a sharp peremptory tap, and brought their dance to a stop.

“ ’Ere,” he said, in commanding tones. “ ’Oo are you darncin’ with?”

“I’m darncin’ with ’im,” answered the girl, pertly, indicating the Englishman with a jerk of her head.

“Ho, you’re darncin’ with ’im, are you? ’E brought you ’ere, p’r’aps?”

“No, he didn’t,” she said.

“No,” said he. “You know well enough ’e didn’t.”

While this conversation was going on, the Englishman maintained an attitude of dignified reserve, leaving it to the lady to decide who was to be the favoured man. At last he felt it was hardly right for an Oxford man, and a triple blue at that, to be discussed in this contemptuous way by a larrikin and his “donah,” so he broke into the discussion, perhaps a little abruptly, but using his most polished style.

“I⁠—ah⁠—asked this lady to dance, and if she⁠—er⁠—will do me the honour,” he said, “I⁠—”

Still no sign from Red Mick. No one stirred about the place; the fowls still fluttered in the dust, and a dissipated looking pet cockatoo, perched on the wood-heap repeated several times in a drowsy tone, “Goodbye, Cockie! Goodbye, Cockie!” Then the door opened, and Red Mick stepped out.

He was the acknowledged leader of the Doyle-Donohoe faction in all matters of cunning, and in all raids on other folks’ stock; and not only did he plan the raids, but took a leading part in executing them. He was the finest and most fearless bush rider in the district, and could track like a black fellow. If he left a strange camp at sundown, and rode about the bush all night, he could at any time go back straight across country to his starting point, or to any place he had visited during his wanderings. Such bushmanship is a gift, and not to be learnt. If once he saw a horse, he would know it again for the rest of his life⁠—fat or lean, sick or well. Which is also a gift.

In appearance he was a tall, lanky, large-handed, slab-sided cornstalk, about thirty-five years of age, with a huge red beard that nearly covered his face, and a brick-dust complexion variegated with large freckles. His legs were long and straight; he wore tight-fitting white moleskin trousers, a coloured Crimean shirt, and a battered felt hat.

“He’s in the yard,” said Charlie. “Let’s go up.”

The cloud of dust shifted from place to place, and out of it came a medley of weird oaths, the dull thudding of a waddy, and the heavy breathing of men and animals in combat. Suddenly a lithe, sinewy black boy, dressed in a short blue shirt, bounded like a squirrel to the top of the fence and perched there; and through the mist they saw a very tall old man, holding on like grim death to the end of a long rope, and being hauled about the yard in great jumps by a half-grown steer. Behind the steer another black boy dodged in and out, welting and prodding it from time to time with a bamboo pole. Maddened by the blows, the steer would dash forward and narrowly miss impaling the man on his horns; then, taking advantage of his impetus, the old man would try to haul him into a smaller yard. Every time he got to the gate the steer yanked him out again by a series of backward springs that would have hauled along a dromedary, and the struggle began all over again. The black boy on the fence dropped down with the agility of a panther, took up the rope behind the old man, and pulled for all he was worth.

“Hit him there, Billy! Whack him! Come on, you son of a cow! I’ll pull you in if I have to pull your head off. Come on, now!” And once more the struggle raged furiously.

When Charlie and Carew rode up to the store they did not see Pike, nor did they expect to see him. By some mysterious Providence they had arrived the very day the coach started on its monthly trip down to Barcoo; and in front of the hotel were congregated quite a number of people⁠—Pike’s wife and his half-wild children, a handful of bushmen, station hands, opal miners, and whatnot, and last, but not least, a fat lady of about forty summers, with flaring red hair.

She was a fine “lump” of a woman, with broad shoulders, and nearly the same breadth all the way down to her feet. She wore a rusty black dress, which fitted perilously tight to her arms and bust; on her head was a lopsided, dismantled black bonnet with a feather⁠—a bonnet that had evidently been put away in a drawer and forgotten for years. Any want of colour or style in her dress was amply made up for by the fact that she positively glowed with opals. Her huge, thick fingers twinkled with opal rings; from each of her ears there dangled an opal earring the size of a form; her old dress was secured round her thick, muscular neck by a brooch that looked like an opal quarry, and whenever she turned to the sun she flashed out rays like a lighthouse.